Kakao Games subsidiary Friends Games will change its name to Meta Bora and further develop the network of companies supporting its Bora cryptocurrency.
The move comes as investor focus shifts toward the metaverse and companies seek to capitalize on the interest in virtual worlds. It also comes as game companies struggle against weak gamer and market sentiment, with stock prices down by almost a third from their highs.
"We believe that blockchain technology will become the essence of Web 3.0 and metaverse, which is why we will be supporting Bora with our expertise and network," Kakao Games CEO Cho Kye-hyun said on Tuesday.
Web 3.0 is the idea of a decentralized internet that provides more personalized service based on blockchain and digital tokens. Fused with the metaverse, individuals can connect to a virtual world and carry out everyday activities as they do in real life.
In a move that resembles Facebook's transformation to Meta, the Friends Games makeover is a step in the game company's shift toward building a foundation for a metaverse that Kakao aims to build in the future. Meta's stock is down by 29 percent since the rebranding exercise.
To start off the ecosystem, Kakao's gaming and entertainment subsidiaries will join Bora Governance Council, a partnership involving about 20 companies.
Kakao Entertainment and Kakao Games will provide their expertise in content management and distribution, such as webtoons and games. Kakao Enterprise, the software research subsidiary of Kakao, will help out with the software needed to manage an online platform.
Other games companies in the tech industry will join, such as game developers Lionheart Studio, Neptune and Wemade, as well as entertainment companies Sandbox and Collab Asia.
Fluidity and openness between the Bora partner services will be the key to the system, stressed Jeong Wook, CEO of Neptune.
The company will also change Bora's privately-managed structure to an open one, to allow a higher level of interoperability between the services provided by the Bora and those provided by Klaytn blockchain platforms.
Klaytn is a public blockchain platform operated by Ground X, a Kakao blockchain subsidiary.
"Within the renewed Bora ecosystem, users will be able to earn an NFT while playing games and then exchange that for a chance to attend meet-and-greet sessions with their favorite singers or an NFT of an Esports player," Jeong said.
The goal for this year is to release 10 play-to-earn (P2E) games. P2E games are games where gamers get to earn items while playing and cash in those items to real money. One game set for release in July is Archeworld developed by XL Games. It is a P2E massively multiplayer online roleplaying game (Mmorpg) based on the Archeage franchise.
The game will offer a transparent system that allows users to see the real-time probability of winning items from random boxes and make money from the items they earn within the game, XL Games CEO Choi Kwan-ho said.
"We believe that Mmorpg games have the closest form of service to the metaverse," said Choi. "People question where the metaverse truly exists, and whether it's just blurted by tech companies as a marketing strategy. But we want to give back to the users and the way to do that is to let the users possess what they earn."
Source: KoreaJoongAngDaily
